


You can be King again

by spacekathy



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Canon Compliant, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Minor Hanamaki Takahiro/Matsukawa Issei, Oikawa Tooru-centric, but also first in later chapters, gifted vs hard-working, kinda comfort.., manga spoilers in later chapters, no beta we die like erwin smith
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:54:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,562
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28359663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacekathy/pseuds/spacekathy
Summary: If we want a happy ending, we need to decide when our story ends.Oikawa Tooru comes to witness the course of the ordinary while trying to fight the end of his own story.  In this world, we have either the gifted or the hard-working people. And the fine line between them can be explained by the simple example; hardworking people answer questions, while gifted people ask them.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Kudos: 6





	You can be King again

**Author's Note:**

> i finally made up my mind to post this somewhat older drabble so i could sit down and write more chapters. Because I'm very in love with the idea that comes with this fanfiction. as an Oikawa kinnie this all hits close too home.
> 
> ** i just want too add ** that i don't want to attack any character or 'gifted' people. i don't want to say that gifted people aren't hard-working! some really are, but i also add things that i witnessed from gifted people who get everything handed to them, while my own hard work doesn't bring me any further. 
> 
> can't promise regular updates, but i will try my best!
> 
> [my tumblr](https://bokuois.tumblr.com/)

If we want a happy ending, we can’t give up. 

But is it really that simple? Is the key to our dreams actually just believing in ourselves? Are the fights, the tears, and the blood sweating work just a side note in our story? It definitely sounds much easier when all you need is faith, rather than hard work. 

However, it’s much harder to believe in yourself, to see the positive things about oneself, when even with hard work you get struck down over and over again. And that by people who neither work hard nor trust in their abilities. 

Then what even is the point in fighting or working when you get surpassed by people who are gifted with a high amount of talent, you only could wish to brush with the tips of your fingers after years of training?   
There may not be a right answer to that question, it’s up to every individuum to find their strength to strive after control, get rid of the monsters inside their heads and put all their faults to bed.

Oikawa Tooru is someone who is psychologically tortured by the curse of ordinary. He’s a very hard-working person. He learned early on that his skills only can get better with hard training and practice. Nothing is given to you, he has to train his body, his brain, to work at the highest level. He has to practice to reach are certain magnitude as other players around him. 

At least, that’s what he believed. But life is an unfair and funny game and so Oikawa one day faced a wing spiker gifted with an amount of talent Oikawa secretly dreamt of. 

Oikawa was normally someone to laugh everything off. His dumbly perfect smile really let you believe everything was okay. He learned young that your face can't show what you're secretly hiding in your hands. His first year of middle school reminded Oikawa of these experiences. He was smart, on and off-court and his swiftness alongside with his body build played into his hands and let him get better and better with every night he stayed in longer to train his skills and abilities. 

Oikawa wasn’t a regular player yet, there still was a third-year player that with his further in experience surpassed him just a tiny bit.   
It gave the voice inside his head another reason to remind Oikawa about, that he wasn’t good enough. Distorting after being enough is probably what started tearing Oikawa apart. To cube with this factor, he got extremely competitive and searched for appreciation and satisfaction in small challenges. Oikawa tried in vain to feel the feeling of being enough, but this notion never sparkled up inside of him.

In his second year of middle school Oikawa finally became a regular setter and could nearly smell the big arene in Japan, he felt the cheers crawling down his back and leave a comfortable thin layer of excitement. He was sure they would go to nationals this year. The next step in his dream was only one game away, an easy game how Oikawa calculated. 

That’s why it ate Oikawa up with every ball that hit the ground beside him, with every toss from him that wasn’t good enough to be spiked and earn points. He couldn't stop the point difference to grow further apart, no matter what he did, and he lost the first set. The next set didn’t go any smoother, he lost point after point, after point. All at once Shiratorizawa suddenly hat the match ball and Oikawa dived for the ball, which was hit with full force though the hands of the blockers. He could feel the ball hit the tip of his fingers and roll from them to the ground. The following sound of the final whistle sounded like mockery in Oikawa's ears as he slowly raised to his knees. 

The then given sight in front of Oikawa cut into his brain like a scar. Ushijima Wakatoshi stood in front of Oikawa with his head held high, while he himself was crouched and dejected on the hall floor. His pounding heart was almost ringing in his ears and Oikawa feared that his supporting hands on the floor would soon slip away as much as he was sweating.

_Beaten. Lost. Failure._ \- Shot through his head like a mantra. He had worked so hard; how could it be that a single player could beat him?

Oikawa's irregular breath tightened in his lungs when Ushijima turned on his heel and didn't spare him one more look. Trembling, Oikawa’s sweaty hands formed into fists and he looked downright. He tensed his jaw almost painfully. 

How could he let this happen? Why couldn’t he stop Ushijima? Why couldn’t he figure out his weakness? Why didn’t he practice more? Why wasn’t he good enough?

This miscalculation by Oikawa was the reason that the monster inside his head suddenly expanded to a crowd of laughing demons.   
Oikawa wanted to keep claiming, wanted to reach new heights and improve his skills to his absolute max. He trained and trained and yet he couldn’t win one set against Ushijima. 

-

Oikawa never really liked surprises. They came unexpected. They didn’t allow him to prepare himself for them. The win from Shiratorizawa and the player Ushijima Wakatoshi were surprises for Oikawa, he could have been prepared for, but he wasn’t. Why wasn’t he? 

He asked himself this question repeatedly all the way from the Metropolitan Gymnasium to their school and his way home. Maybe it was arrogance that lead him to believe no one could beat him, maybe he lacked on training – his tosses weren’t as good, as they normally should’ve been. Either way it changed nothing about the hurtful fact that he did lose, that he failed and not will go nationals in spring. 

That night Oikawa didn’t sleep. He sat in front of his laptop, headphones on and watched each game of Shiratorizawa. Closely he scanned, analysed, and studied every move of Ushijima. How he placed his feet before jumping off, exanimated the point when the spiker would react, how Ushijima spiked the ball, where his hit point laid and how his body moved in the air. Oikawa noticed the tiny inconspicuous factor that Ushijima twisted his leg slightly before every jump to make his left blow more effective, but also how his teammates protected their wing spiker like a treasure and never let anyone aim at him, to strike down his attack.   
Oikawa observed how the setter behaved towards Ushijima and the other players in different situations. Shiratorizawa played as if Ushijima were their centrepiece and they just circled around him, not as if Ushijima were circling with them. 

They used the same structure when Oikawa was playing against him. Ushijima got pushed by his teammates so much, that he single-handily outplayed him. Ushijima whipped the floor with Oikawa and didn’t let him breathe a second. 

This was the first time Oikawa tasted the talent of the so-called gifted people and the time he started a fight against the tide trying to prevent the inevitable. 

Since then, Oikawa was even more strict on himself.

He has always been different from others. He was never satisfied. No toss was exact enough, no step was fast enough, and no serve was perfect enough. Where others saw success, he saw only one more conquering obstacle. He didn't pause, didn't give himself time to take a deep breath, to maybe find a way out of his tunnel vision of improving which he had in front of his eyes. Because if he did, he would fail. He was sure of that. He has to get better at all costs and taking a breath meant wasting time and Oikawa didn’t have the luxury of that. Oikawa would beat Ushijima. With more practice, he would achieve this goal.

Or?

He was suffocating, with so little air and space he allowed himself to have. But he needed that feeling, it never let him doubt that he wasn't good enough. If he were so close to failure, he couldn't do enough and would have to keep training. It was like a curse he'd burdened himself with.

But the more he trained, the harder was the punch in the face when he still couldn't win against Ushijima. All the restless nights, sweat, and practice still wasn’t sufficient. Slowly this factor drove Oikawa crazy inside his head.

And then; in third year of middle school a genius showed up behind Oikawa and clawed at his back like a predator. 

Kageyama Tobio. 

He was shining like a bright star. Quite different to Ushijima, he generated light and didn’t allow light to be turned on. With every step on the court, doubts about his incredible talent fled. Each touch with the ball seemed to brighten Kageyama even more. With his technique, skill, and ability, he ended up well ahead of the others in his team. He was a natural. One of the rare gifted one. Nothing seemed to be a hurdle to him, with every touch of the ball he grew on and on, kindling an outstanding fire in his innocent and curious eyes. He was so excited to learn more. 

The trainers were impressed by him. The new ingenious setter who outclassed put the rest of the team. They were certain Kageyama would play internationally one day, he was already above average.

Oikawa knew all of this too. Of cause was he painfully aware of it. The laughing demons in his head left no doubt about it. As always, they said that which he rather would have left unsaid for as long as possible. One day, Kageyama would eventually replace him.  
Because he’s one of those chosen few.

With its recurring rainfall on Ushijima, it was evident that Oikawa was not enough. Not yet. He just had to try harder. It was something different having your opponent on the same team as you. Every mistake counted double, it was just a matter of little missteps that decided about being replaced or not. Oikawa knew he was replaceable, but he wouldn’t let Kageyama take the place he worked so hard for – still is working for – and neither would he let Ushijima defeat him again. He needed to work more, to improve his strength and skills even more. Deep inside his head, a tiny voice showed up behind his demons and almost barely audible whispered, that it wanted to shine just like Kageyama and Ushijima. 

Maybe even more. It wanted to be special too. 

And so, from that day on, Oikawa pushed himself even harder.

Oikawa started to stay longer and longer in after practice, he asked everyone he knew if he could set the ball for them if they helped him get better. In the beginning, his team was still there, after all, it never hurt to practice more, but over time there were less and fewer people who stayed for extra training. Oikawa grew beyond normal human expectations and soon there was only him and his ace Iwaizumi left when the darkness was already creeping through the streets.

Oikawa was aware that he set goals beyond limits and thus divorced his team more, but he believed that if he did better, he would soon be recognized again. With more training, more work, he would be able to grow beyond himself. He just has to work on all of his faults.

"You work way too hard! Didn't the coach tell you that yesterday?!" 

Iwaizumi had his hands in his sides and was standing behind Oikawa, who was throwing and hitting ball after ball. It was well past the time allowed for the volleyball team to use the gym.

Oikawa, however, showed no signs of stopping his action.

It was true, the coach had told him he was training too much; but what did he know?  
Oikawa needed more practice to keep up with his goals. Even if no one else could see it, Oikawa was well aware of his flaws like a red warning light. They had such a start precisely that he wondered how they could be overlooked. Oikawa stubbornly leaned forward and tossed the ball in his hand, but before he could jump up to serve, Iwaizumi pushed him forward. Oikawa landed roughly on his knees. Startled, Oikawa turned around to get a look on Iwaizumi - who had caught the ball that had been thrown up and was already packing it into the basket with the others.

"If you hurt yourself, you don't bring us anything, let's call this a fucking day", while he was speaking Iwaizumi had grabbed the collar of Oikawa's T-shirt and pulled him behind him. Oikawa just let it happen. Exhausted, his body only stumbled behind Iwazumi’s quick steps. Now that he stopped focusing on the other end of the court, he could feel the tiredness controlling his limbs. 

"You go into the shower while I take down the net." The ace ordered him around and Oikawa did what he was told without a word.  
There was still time for him, he could still practice tomorrow, he told himself, but the demons in his head gave him away. Laughing, they reminded him of the threats that sat dangerously close to his neck. Carefully he turned his head a little and looked out of the corner of his eye at Iwazumi, who was standing menacingly next to the pillar of the net.

"Don't even think about it Shittykawa, it's damned for today!"

The lukewarm water from the shower fell down on Oikawa, preventing him from disappearing from this reality. Lost in his hunting thoughts, he looked along with the pattern of the tiles, watching water struggled through the grooves and covered the room with a slightly steaming layer.

-

It isn’t that Oikawa suddenly was bad at volleyball, not at all. Just in a matter of nature and evolution; Individuals who may have the mindset, the training or the strength for the instance to be the best or to be better than some who has the gift of talent, are destined to be disappointed.

Oikawa didn't know this yet, but he started to wonder, something was definitely wrong.

Because of this constant fight in Oikawa's mind, he began to lose control. This was clearly evident when Oikawa started making many mistakes in a training match. He was unfocused and his constant combo mistakes made it clear that he lacked composure. This resulted in complete chaos on the field. The attackers ran around like crazy to reach the imprecise balls of their setter, the defence desperate at the absent-mindedness of their teammate and the libero tried desperately to get out of the shadow of Oikawa because he wanted to accept the ball with unnecessary hacking. 

When a timeout got whistled, the first thing Oikawa did was look at the point board and was hit with a crashing sight. He knew that he failed again and again in this game, just like in their first fight with the Shiratorizawa middle school. But he made an extra effort this time, tried to make up for all the mistakes he made in the named game, so what's going wrong? Why is he still not good enough? 

Exhausted, he leaned his hands upon his knees and immediately felt the sweat running down his face. He just had to try harder and then he can turn the tide and win this match. He was next to serve and he would show them all the improvement he made with his jump and score a serving ace. He only needed to push himself a little more-

“Kageyama, you’re in!”

The sharpen voice of their trainer shattered Oikawa's thoughts like a glass on the floor. He looked up, trembling, and was confronted with the sight of the gifted child. Kageyama held up his hand and just waited to be clapped off by Oikawa, which would free him from the bank. His eyes sparkled with excitement, and Oikawa shivered beneath them. Slowly he stood upright again and took the first step in the direction of his opponent. Every step became harder and more painful. As if Oikawa was walking a path made of broken glass, knives, and needles.

When he clapped off with Kageyama and released him to the freedom of the court, his hand felt like it was starting to burn. Like goosebumps, this burning feeling spread all over his whole body. Oikawa clenched his jaw and breathed shakily in and out through his nose. Everything in him seemed to boil, his whole body screamed, refusing to acknowledge this double defeat.

Furious, Oikawa dropped onto the bench. His fingers clutched his knees in pain as if they could cool the burn in his hands and keep Oikawa from falling. He had failed. First against Ushijima and now against the incredible genie. 

How?

Since the minute you start thinking for yourself as a small child, you have been redeemed to achieve something. Be it the first babbled words that your brain can shape, be it the first steps or the first time you can use the toilet on your own. Your parents are telling you over and over again to try and practice until you reach your goal and even then, you should keep practising. There are more words to learn, more steps to be taken, more things that you will eventually have to master on your own. An endless list of tasks and goals that you have to achieve. 

Every beginning is difficult, but over time, steps and words become a matter of course, like riding a bicycle. At some point, you can just do it, almost unconsciously.

But then school starts.

Expectations are thrown at you like stones to be caught with your arms tied together. Daily burdens and tasks that you have to solve in order to receive the otherwise natural recognition of your fellow human beings. It’s only with great effort that you force your way through this flowing river and try to achieve more strength with each swim in order to make the next move easier.

Oikawa, therefore, learned early on that only with hard work and practice your talent and life can get better. Nothing is given to you; you have to train your body and your brain to work at the highest quality. You have to practice.

_Practice, practice, practice._

Oikawa practiced walking. Until he was able to run at an above-average young age. Oikawa practiced speaking. His parents taught him more and more new, bigger, longer words at top speed. Oikawa practiced cycling so that when he was five, he could show his friends his first trick. Oikawa practiced for each of his tests in school, practicing until the answers played back to him like a film in front of his eyes. Oikawa practiced his handwriting to make it look clear even when he was writing in a hurry. Those practiced things produced results, excellent results. So why didn't his volleyball skills get him any further? Hasn’t he learned that training, practicing and hard work would be the key to his dreams? Why didn’t his afford to bring him good results? 

This question sneaks threateningly into Oikawa's mind. All around he dumbly heard the calls and the pounding of shoes on the hall floor. Oikawa gasped after air in order to bring his persistent restless breathing under control, he needed to find a way back on the court. He couldn’t give up now. 

Still, with every passing second, it felt as if more and more stones were being deposited on his back and shoulders, which made him shrink even more into himself. With his eyes squeezed together, he took his hands off his saving knees to hide his face in them. His heart started racing again. Seeking help, he tried to focus his gaze on the ground, while his hands clawed his sweaty hair like an anchor into the sand, to not let the ship being taken by the dangerous force of the unbreakable sea.

Why didn't he find a way out? Why wasn't he prepared for such a situation? Wasn't his training good enough? 

Everything seemed to move in time lapse when he looked up and watched how Kageyama played one pass after the other perfectly, so the attackers could spike every single one and earn point after point. Oikawa's eyes twitched imperceptibly and for the first time in this game, he looked at Iwaizumi. His teammate stood at the other end of the court, arms hanging down beside him and his hands clenched to fists. His head was slightly turned to the side and made him already looking in Oikawa’s direction.

The ace didn't say anything, didn’t shoot an insult over the whole arena nor did he move or change anything on his facial expression. He knew Oikawa understood. How could Oikawa not understand this silent torturing that was given him?

Nevertheless, Oikawa snorted and a quiet _"tsk"_ left his trembling lips, angrily he turned his head to the side. Away from Iwaizumi’s scanning eyes.

That day Oikawa realised something. Skill doesn’t bring you anyway, it’s your talent. And the painful truth was, that Kageyama has this natural talent. While all Oikawa had, was training and at some point, this doesn’t bring you any further.  
Sometimes we just don’t have a talent in the areas we wish we had and slowly, like the first drops of rainfall before a big and shattering storm, this realization crashed down on Oikawa. 

This wasn’t fair, why should some people be granted with talent when he works so hard and still cannot reach their peak?

Why wasn’t he good enough in something he normally loved? Why was is life a constant fight against a strong force? Why couldn’t he just be gifted too?

-

That evening, the voices that swarmed around in his head, laughing and spiteful, won and Oikawa barricaded himself in the gym of his school. Ball after ball flew over the stretched net in the middle of the room and hit the floor loudly on the other side. But no hit, no jump, no impact was acceptable for Oikawa, none of these things was remotely sufficient. Not enough. It was not enough, not for himself nor for others.

With a quick jerky movement, Oikawa grabbed the next ball from the basket and turned it in one skilful motion between his hands. Oikawa couldn't even count how often he had been in this position. Legs a bit spread, hands on the top and bottom of the ball - which at the moment felt like a heavy metal ball – and body straightened. Oikawa's arm stretched out in front of him, his gaze went just past the highest point of the ball and fixed on the other side of the court. Before he even gave himself time to take a deep breath, he bent his knees, threw the ball in the air, and jumped.

From the first contact with the ball, Oikawa noticed that something was wrong. The tips of his fingers touched the ball at a turning point that was too high and with imprecise concentrated force the ball flew directly against the net.

Oikawa's chest rose and fell again irregularly, exasperated he watched the ball as it rolled over the hall floor with small hops. His nostrils widened and his eyebrows contracted almost painfully. With a swing, he turned to the side and took another ball out of the basket, whereby Oikawa clearly had gained too much momentum and was about to fall forward with the ball since he needed to bend very far down due to the almost exhausted balls had to.

With unbundled energy that was only seething in him from all the fails that he seemed to provide like a treadmill. He threw the ball in the air and spiked with all the anger that boiled up inside of him. In a high curve, the ball flew unrestrained over the net and hit next to the rest of the already spiked balls.

With a loud sigh, he leaned his hands on his knees. He was breathing heavily in and out. His gaze was still fixed on the ball which he just had spiked over the net. A serve like this was draining and the feeling of exhaustion in his arms drove Oikawa crazy. He had to stand firm, he couldn’t be replaced again, he needed more endurance, more accuracy, more practice, more ability, more experience, more, more, more...

“Oikawa-san, could you maybe teach me how to do your serve?”

The innocent voice of Kageyama stabbed itself like a sword directly into his body provoked unbridled anger. The air painfully got stuck in his throat. A shivering cold made its way from his legs, across his back, up to his ears. Like wool, the cold left a scratchy and stuffy feeling behind. His blood began to pound in his ears while his tongue tried in vain to fill his parched mouth with moisture. His hands that tried to support each other on his knees began to tremble. Slowly, Oikawa turned his head in the direction of Kageyama. The little happy smile dug like a needle deep into his scratchy skin. Irregularly, the air escaped Oikawa's lungs and fled outside seeking help. His whole body was on high speed, while his surroundings did not seem to move a millimetre.

The world disappeared before Oikawa's eyes and instead of Kageyama's innocent face, he saw the red, contorted grimaces of monstrous demons. Everything seemed bogged down, straight lines curved into meandering lines, colours mingled with each other while everything seemed to spin around. Oikawa wanted to scream. He wanted to escape these voices. But not a sound left his lips.

The branded image of Ushijima, standing menacingly over Oikawa, lit up all over his sight. Ushijima laughed, they all laughed. The voices in his head, Ushijima and Kageyama. They all laughed. Loud and shrill. Spiteful and angry. They all locked Oikawa in a cage of loud noises, failure, and darkness. They stood tall above him like giants he could never reach. Looking down at him with their torn mouths, red eyes, endless bodies. Contorted with fear, Oikawa turned in a circle, trying to escape the amused laughter. With all his might he ran, he just wanted to escape. The demons seemed to be chasing him and with every step these geniuses took, it felt as if they were pinning Oikawa on the ground. These gifted people were faster than him and soon they sprinted past the Oikawa crawling on the ground with ease and a wink.

They need to go away. They need to leave him alone. Need to be quiet, stop making noises. Far away. They should fucking leave him alone. Don’t come any close. Go away. 

Furious he raised his hand; all he saw were the demonic giants turning around and steering towards him. 

Before Oikawa could hit anything, an unnatural warmth gripped his wrist. His surroundings were again flooded with light. In front of him, he saw Kageyama, looking confused. Hesitantly Oikawa followed the arm that had stopped his own before he could touch the first year in front of him. 

Iwaizumi looked at him. 

Oikawa blinked and tried to read Iwaizumi's face. Iwaizumi's lips moved and something angry had to leave them, but Oikawa couldn’t tell what. However, all Oikawa heard was a constant loud beeping. His own lips also seemed to shape something, but the words did not reach his ears either. Iwaizumi's voice and the stomping steps of Kageyama continued to come to his brain only muffled. Oikawa stared into the void, bewildered. His hands were still shaking, and he was standing uncomfortable, the ground seemed to burn underneath him. 

His nails dug into his palms. Breathing was hard. Really hard. As if he’d just run the London Marathon

Only when Iwazumi uttered the words "take a deep breath" did it pull him back into reality again.

"You were replaced today because you have to calm down again. Give yourself a break."

Furious, Oikawa blew the air out of his lungs and furrowed his eyebrows. His teeth snapped together briefly before turning to Iwaizumi angrily. All the strange and overwhelming feelings that Oikawa never wanted to express seemed to patter out of him with anger.

"I can't do that! With the state I’m in now, I can't win against Shiratorizawa. Not if I'm not good enough. If I want to go to the nationals, I have to work as hard as I can. How should I take a break?" 

Take a break, Oikawa almost wanted to laugh. Only geniuses have the time to take breaks. They get gifted with a talent from birth given - like a gold gift. Everything comes along for them. People like Oikawa don't have the luxury of taking a deep breath and Iwazumi should know that.   
Oikawa's train of thought was interrupted by the loud grumble of Iwaizumi. Whose expression had turned into an angry one too.

"Everything you say is always just ME, ME ME! Shut up" and with a skilful, fast move, he gave Oikawa a hard push forward, which lead Oikawa to fall back on the floor. The painfully uncomfortable contact with the ground, let all the voices in his head go out like a light switch. Now the only loud voice of Iwaizumi reached Oikawa like cold freshwater.

"Do you think you are playing alone?"

With wide eyes, Oikawa looked up at Iwazumi, who leaned down and grabbed Oikawa by his collar to force him to keep looking Iwazumi in the eyes.

"You listen to me dumbass. You better stop acting like your performance is the only one that matters, or I’ll start beating you up!"

Oikawa's now completely silent and quiet brain only brings in out of sheer amazement; "You're already beating me up!"

Iwaizumi paused after that before he continued:

"I'm sure none of us has what it takes to beat Usjiiwaka one in one, but still, that's why there are six people on a volleyball court!" Oikawa's eyes twitched slightly; it was like Iwaizumi’s words kindled a little fire in them. The first flame burned gently and delicately. Just waited for the wind to take on it and start a wildfire. 

Six people. _Team._ That word started blinking like a big advertisement in his head. Team. He, Iwaizumi, the rest of his crew were a team.

"Who cares about that genius first year or Ushiwaka. At the end of the day, the best team of six wins, dumbass!"

Iwaizumi grew louder with every word he spoke. Iwaizumi was already breathing heavily from all the screaming. His nostrils were wide open, and his eyebrows were soon pointing diagonally. The two still looked into each other's eyes. For a brief moment, everything was quiet. The world seemed to stand still, just waiting for Oikawa to make it spin again. But all Oikawa did was laugh. he could only laugh. Nothing else seemed to be right. Confused, Iwaizumi let go of him.

"Sorry, I must have been too harsh."

Oikawa just shook his head and got to his feet. The previous little fire in his eyes burned like crazy now and spread rapidly over his whole body. But this time it was a comfortable feeling. As if it created a shield this time.

After all the nights in which he locked himself in his room without sleep to watch repetitions of different volleyball games, after all the hours he spent day after day in this gym to improve every possible mistake he could make, after all the noisy nights in his bed, when the voices in his head were opposite each other yelling at him and not giving him a solution, to the question; why he just wasn't enough, was the right solution to being yelled at by Iwaizumi?

It was just as ridiculous as the answer itself.

"The best team of six huh?" he repeated with a laugh.

Iwaizumi was right. Regardless of whether it was an annoying first year or Ushijima, he had something that neither of these demons had - a team. Oikawa couldn’t be better than the worst player on his own team. No matter who it was, nobody could grow above themselves if their own setter didn't give them the tosses they best could spike.

"I can't describe how I am feeling right now. It's like I’m invincible."

Oikawa had an idea, a new goal that shone brightly up beside his first one. With a long-awaited smile, he turned to Iwaizumi, "Tell me Iwa-chan, is dumbass the only insult you know?" Oikawa laughed at Iwaizumi's face, which yet again formed to an angry frown. 

"Tell me Shittykawa, do you really want to be beaten up?" Still laughing, Oikawa stretched his arms high up into the air, as if he already were reaching for the stars and caught a glimpse of Iwaizumi's smiling face. 

A team.

The voices in his head still seemed to scream loudly at him, but it was a lot more bearable. It seemed like it was a few less than before. As if some of the heavy stones on his back got pushed down and made him able to move just a bit more.

If he needs to go down, he will go down fighting.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! funny how i think, that me writtng about oikawa not feeling good enough, isn't good enough. i'm really not sure if the emotions and hidden meanings between the lines come across as i want to, haha. 
> 
> gladly leave a comment and a kudo! 
> 
> [follow me on tumblr and rant about bokuoi with me](https://bokuois.tumblr.com/)


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